About

FRAMED* — A Revolutionary Platform For Digital Art
$529,339
959
Our Kickstarter campaign is over, but you can signup and pre-order FRAMED* 2.0 through our website: http://frm.fm/


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Dynamic Display: Gorgeous Full-HD display with IPS technology, 16.7 million colors, ultra contrast, and 180° viewing angle.
- Timeless Design: Hand-crafted walnut frame, perfect for any backdrop, plus additional options for custom colors.
- Interactivity & Sensors: Create reactive works using motion, sound, gestures and various data inputs.
- Smartphone Integration: Instantly display artworks from anywhere in the room, directly from your iPhone or Android.
- Unlimited Media Types: Supports GIFs, video, animation, graphics, Flash, Processing, openFrameworks, and more...
- Publish and Sell Your Artwork: Share your own creations, curate a selection of artists, and get your ideas framed on walls around the world!
→ 日本語解説ページはこちらからご覧ください



Bringing Digital Art to Life
FRAMED is an Internet connected display that allows you to showcase artwork in a way that has never been done before.
Designed to be the world's first canvas for the art of our generation, allowing you to experience and enjoy beautiful art within a normal, everyday setting. Perfect for creators and fans of visual culture alike, hang it on your wall, choose an artwork, and transform your space into a living, virtual gallery of creative expressions.
The evolution of technology and accessibility of the internet has brought out an expansive range and depth in digital art, and now, FRAMED can bring digital art into your everyday.
Timeless Design, Infinite Possibilities
Over the course of a year, we've built two sizes (24-inch / 40-inch) with immense care and attention to craftsmanship. Every unit contains a gorgeous full-HD display, graphics processing, integrated inputs, and motion sensors within a mere 18mm (0.7 inches) in depth. We've created a minimalist object as the perfect backdrop for showcasing artwork, while maintaining powerful features to allow each frame to be totally unique, and exactly what you, the creator, makes of it. The power of expression is yours!




Each frame is hand-crafted from walnut, left simple and undecorated to bring out the flawlessness of the wood material. We also offer custom-colors for those seeking a unique fit for their interiors.



Instantly Collect Artworks From All Over The World
Artists from all over the world offer a wide spectrum of artwork to be instantly collected and enjoyed on FRAMED. With dedicated web and smartphone apps, anyone can easily explore an infinite range of visualizations, with support for various formats including: graphics, illustration, GIFs, animation, video, openFrameworks, Flash, Processing, and more..


The Beautiful Internet On Your Wall
FRAMED showcases all types of artworks found on the Web, while you're browsing through Tumblr, when you find your favorite artwork, or updating your own portfolio. Send artworks at any moment and display them inside your living room, office or public spaces.


Immersive Interface With Hand Gestures
Instead of using touch screens, gesture recognition allows you to control and interact with FRAMED with simple movements of your hand. Our revamped interface simplifies the user experience for more practical use, so you don't have to continue walking back to navigate or switch artworks.


Seamless Smartphone Integration
FRAMED is seamlessly integrated with our smartphone app (free), functioning as an intelligent control system to explore and build a collection of artwork disseminated across the web. With your touchscreen, FRAMED reacts instantly for those seeking an immersive and interactive experience.


A Publishing Platform For Artists
As designers ourselves, we couldn’t be more excited about the opportunity to create a marketplace where artists can freely publish and sell their work — and we’re thrilled to present a roster of incredible artists to Kickstarter Backers, including:

Aaron Koblin uses real-world and community generated data to reflect on cultural trends and the changing relationship between humans and the systems they create — Takashi Kawashima explores the re-contextualizing of commonplace items to create new awareness of the mundane.

Universal Everything is a multidisciplinary studio at the crossover between design and art, exploring the tension between abstract and figurative with sound and image, leading to expressive, vibrant digital artworks, embodied with emergent life and anthropomorphism.

Mirai Mizue began making animation, primarily on abstract works using cellular motifs and geometric patterns. His works have been recognized at many film festivals, including the Venice Film Festival where his work was nominated.
Also Featuring:
- Chris Davenport / interactive media
- Nerhol / photography, sculpture
- Qubibi / animation, interactive media
- Yugop / interactive media
- and more!
If you're an artist, creative, designer, or simply a fan of visual culture, we want to hear from you! Your initial feedback will be invaluable in creating the best experience for both artists and users across the platform.
The Community
We are currently extending our efforts by opening conversations with leading voices within the digital arts community. This includes commissioning artists and curators to create original works and collections for FRAMED, supporting the community, and exploring ways to push the medium into new conversations. Some of these include: Filip Visnjic from CreativeApplications.Net / HOLO Magazine, Regine Debatty from We Make Money Not Art, Rich Oglesby from Prosthetic Knowledge, Pieter Snoeck from Today and Tomorrow, and Emilio Gomariz from Triangulation.

Why We Need Your Support
Today we're roughly 80% complete with the design and engineering phase, and we need your help and support to get FRAMED delivered to backers around the globe.
By pre-ordering now you’ll help us reach our last crucial milestone: purchasing the injection molds that will provide us with high-quality parts needed to deliver a consumer-grade product. In return, you'll get one of the first FRAMED displays and be an early adopter of this exciting project. For that we can't thank you enough!




FRAMED Specifications
- Dimensions: 24-inch (553 x 321 x 18)
- Dimensions: 40-inch (976 x 550 x 29)
- Weight: 5 lbs (2.3kg), 22 lbs (10kg)
- Full-HD 1080p IPS display
- 16.7 million colors
- Quad-core CPU up to 2.4 GHz
- Integrated HD graphics up to 854 MHz
Interactivity & IO
- Smartphone integration
- WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
- Motion sensors
- Gesture recognition
- 720p camera
- 2x stereo speaker output
- Mono microphone input
Timeline For Delivery


Who Are We?
FRM was founded in 2011 by Yugo Nakamura and William Lai. Our team has collectively worked together for four years developing FRAMED, and individually in spaces directly relevant to the web, interactive media, and consumer electronics.
FRAMED 2.0 will be our second release to date: In 2012, we reimagined a canvas for new art forms with FRAMED 1.0. Over the next two years, we have been extremely humbled to have the support of artists and designer friends, and some of the world's most progressive brands as our customers.
Yugo Nakamura (@yugop) is a creative director, designer and engineer exploring various forms of interactive systems in digital and networked environments. Artworks from his personal website: yugop.com have been shown at Center Pompidou (Paris), Kunstlerhaus (Vienna), Design Museum (London). His commercial works through his studio, tha ltd., have received many international awards including Cannes Lions, OneShow, Clio Award, and NY ADC.
William Lai (@williamxlai) is a producer and co-founder of FRM. William’s work spans across product design and user experience, with a focus on physical products combined with the collaborative nature of the web. He is also the founder of TempleATS, a record label operating in Tokyo.
Yoshihiro Saito (@ys44163110) is an interior & product designer, and founder of A-study. Yoshihiro’s breadth of work includes architecture for residences, store interiors and product design for clients: United Arrows, Strasburgo and Hotel Claska.
Tim Lee is an engineer with over a decade’s experience producing consumer devices, and contributing to open-source initiatives such as Openmoko. He single-handedly built and implemented the first version of FRAMED.
Koji Takahashi (@kojing) is a web designer and programmer that makes things with a precision and passion he takes to his music videos, short films and overall creative outputs.
Kentaro Yama (@kentaroid) is a designer and lead systems engineer working across a multitude of platforms and client works, including the recently featured UTMe for Uniqlo.
Keiji Hokamura (@polikeiji) - is a creative coder and engineer who works with mobile and desktop environments, with credits to curating framed displays, and creative coding for a multitude of clients.

A Very Special Thanks
We're greatly indebted to the inspiration and contributions from supporters of past and present time, and the pioneering work of those pushing us forward : THA / Tomoko Yaguchi / Gou Kinoshita / Keita Kitamura / Erica Sakai / Kotoko Koya / A-Study / Yoshihiro Saito / Yuka Yamagishi / ADS / Sean Moss-Pultz / John Maeda / Timothy Chen / Scott Soong / Rick Lin / SIC / Steven Wu / Andy Wei / Symbio / Eric Chou / SamyGo / Erdem Altinyurt / Christopher Hall / Cousin Lee / A-Team / Nico Ni / Samsung / Intel Japan / bitforms / TSCA / 21_21 / ggg / WOW / Pixiv / Design Tide / Good Beer Faucets / Mercedes-Benz Connection / Restir / Sanyo / BEAMS / Zikker Studio / SBE / WEST / Takashi Kawashima / Aaron Koblin / Jono Brandel / Chris Davenport / LIA / Shane Mecklenburger / Katie Torn / Memo Akten / Marina Zurkow / Robert Hodgin / Andreas Müller / FIELD / Universal Everything / Kazumasa Teshigawara / Nerhol / Nobue Kitagami / Filip Visnjic / CreativeApplications.Net / HOLO Magazine / Regine Debatty / We Make Money Not Art / Rich Oglesby / Prosthetic Knowledge / Pieter Snoeck / Today and Tomorrow / Emilio Gomariz / Triangulation / Alvin Woon / Cheney Wang / KAMIA / Edward Chyau / Ben Liu / Bob Cheng / Dynamo / Peter Bowles / Heather Delaney / Emma Seddon / James Gillies / UNIF / Christeric / CLASH / A$AP Serz / AND ..
Thank You for taking the time to look at our project — we appreciate your support, and we hope you enjoy the art on your walls *


Risks and challenges
MANUFACTURING
Producing a large volume of identical products is a challenge for anyone, especially for those without a factory at their disposal. We have spent the last two years building relationships with suppliers in Taiwan, allowing us to leverage both the factory system, with it’s standard parts ready for shipping, but also, smaller craft design and fabrication studios with proven track records. Our wood framer, for example, is a leading supplier to museums and art galleries in the region. This gives us the best of both worlds, allowing us to combine inexpensive components with custom components where appropriate. We also have a qualified team in Taipei working full-time on the execution of sourcing, manufacturing and logistics.
SUPPLY CHAIN & ALTERNATIVES
Should manufacturing or sourcing issues arise, we have several options for local fabrication and alternative sources for key components, such as the mainboards required to drive the display. Sourcing custom parts is also not as difficult as it was five years ago, and we are continually impressed by our suppliers’ ability to convert manually-driven fabrications into common industry standards.
INJECTION MOLDING
However, as with most consumer products, injection molding is our primary risk and challenge, which require very large capital upfront, and could take up to 4 months to produce and perfect. For this reason we have put a great deal of strategy into the production of molded parts, along with a parallel plan to produce the same parts by secondary methods like CNC and/or 3D printing in the case of unexpected delays.
OUR EXPERIENCE
We have spent years providing creative solutions to technical problems. Yugo was trained as an architect and designer, and has spent the last decade working on creative solutions for such clients as UNIQLO, MUJI, NHK, and LV, and is considered a leader in his field. William has spent the last six years implementing challenging ideas, and is proudest to have such progressive brands as Mercedes-Benz, Issey Miyake, SLS Hotels, and Intel as FRAMED* customers. We are counting on our past experience to provide both solid logistical planning and readiness to solve problems as they occur.
Questions about this project? Check out the FAQ
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Funding period
- (30 days)